Maalouf is bullish on China's long-term fundamentals despite weak RevPAR, citing economic growth, the middle class and low room penetration.

Maalouf stressed on the call that IHG remains optimistic about China's long-term fundamentals: economic development, middle-class potential and still-low room penetration.

Original (zh)

洲际酒店集团CEO Elie Maalouf在电话会上强调长期看好中国基本面：经济发展、中产阶层潜力、客房渗透率尚低。

Maalouf said most of IHG's conversion hotels are coming from rival brands, which he sees as a flight to quality that benefits IHG.

“Most of them are coming from other brands in the U.S. and around the world,” said CEO Elie Maalouf on the third-quarter trading update. “You can call it a flight to quality in these times, but we think we’re benefiting from it.”

Maalouf said IHG's Q3 RevPAR growth accelerated to 5.3%, driven by broad demand and very strong US performance across all brands.

RevPAR growth accelerated in the third quarter to +5.3% as IHG’s breadth by geography, brands and stay occasions captured increasing guest demand around the world. Our US performance was very strong, with growth across all brands.

Maalouf noted that Middle East was flat and Greater China RevPAR eased due to weather and holiday timing, but growth elsewhere more than offset it.

This growth more than offset a broadly flat performance in the Middle East and an easing of RevPAR in Greater China where adverse weather and changes to public holiday timings impacted demand.

Maalouf expects record development activity and a fifth straight year of accelerating net system growth in 2026.

We expect another year of record development activity, and for 2026 to be our fifth straight year of accelerating net system growth. In Q3, we opened 92 hotels and signed almost twice as many, with 164 properties added to our pipeline.